03 September 2012

Patrick Lawson: Be nimble to keep up with change

Patrick Lawson, Mobiflock

Patrick Lawson,
CEO of Mobiflock is a serial digital entrepreneur who’s as happy playing in the
business space as he is developing new uses for cutting-edge technologies that
service the needs of digital natives. He’s the man behind mobile messaging
service Clickatell, but most recently, Lawson and his team has launched Mobiflock, a new system that keeps us, and more
specifically, our children safe when using their smartphones.

Have you always been entrepreneurial?

Straight out of
school I started a desktop publishing business. It was the early 1990s and I
realised that my computer had far superior graphics capabilities compared to
what else was in the market at the time. This I think was the start of me
seeing technology, realising it could be a game-changer and then identifying
business opportunities based on that. I then went on to build a website for Pam Golding, which became the first to sell a house – sight unseen – in the
southern hemisphere. Next up was Clickatell, the mobile messaging company,
where we realised that there was a need to aggregate SMS messaging channels in
order to offer SMS as an application to person business tool. With Mobiflock, I
took a look at my children and realised they’d soon want their own cellphones –
and probably smartphones. There are so many obvious benefits to them having
smartphones, but at the time there was no way to keep them safe from
inappropriate content, dangerous people, and their own lack of understanding of
consequences – which is part and parcel of growing up.

What were you doing before starting your business?

From the get-go,
the thought of studying and following a corporate path was just not for me.
Early stage startups are far more exciting. For instance, when Clickatell
started becoming a successful, operational focussed company, I realised it was
time to move on.

What kind of planning went into starting the venture?

Fortunately my
experience with Clickatell stood me in good stead here. And absolutely, as
tedious as it might appear to be when all you want to do is hit the ground
running, you need to do the legwork and research to really define the
opportunity you see, make sure your good idea has legs, and that the numbers
stack up. If you do this at the outset, there are fewer nasty surprises down
the road. We also spent a lot of time on designing the product for growth and
working out what our brand is going to stand for.

What was your start up capital and where did you work from?

We bootstrapped
as far as possible, but once we reached proof of concept stage, we received
investment from friends and family. This was followed by an additional private
funding round to get us to commercial launch on Android, BlackBerry and Nokia
Symbian devices. We’re currently looking for additional investment in order to
maximise this global opportunity.

What was your big dream for this venture?

Stage one was
to keep children safe on their smartphones – allowing them to have all the
benefits of a connected digital device, but to stay safe. Simultaneously we’d
be educating parents who are feeling a little bit out of their depth raising
their digital natives. Ultimately however we want to offer security products
and services for every mobile phone and tablet user, including businesses and
individuals.

How does a new entrepreneur find business leads and profit from
them?

In our case,
our business is both online and global, so online is how customers find us. In
South Africa, however, we have been extremely well-received by stakeholders in
this space, and we’ve been having face-to-face meetings with them to demo
Mobiflock and to recruit them as brand ambassadors.We also intend for each and every of our customers to become our
brand ambassadors, recommending the service to other parents in their network.Strategic partnerships, such as those
with handset manufacturers or mobile operators take time, so one simply needs
to work away at these.

How does a new entrepreneur figure out what makes them unique and
leverage that difference?

Listen to your
customers. Have faith in your own vision. Fail frequently and often. And keep
nimble in order to adapt quickly to a changing market – which is a constant in
the mobile space! – and the feedback from your customers.

How does a new entrepreneur figure out what to charge for their
service/product?

Do your market
and customer research and work out what the market will bear. You need to take
your costs into account and work out what profit you will earn to ensure a
sustainable business. In Mobiflock’s case, we offer a cloud-based service,
which means that for every additional customer we get our costs don’t ramp up
as they would with a bricks and mortar business. This means we can easily grow
the business exponentially without risking a massive rise in costs.

What was your most epic fail in the early days?

Not predicting
how quickly the mobile landscape would shift, and choosing as our first
operating system to develop for something that was very quickly eclipsed by
other operating systems. Having said that, the effort wasn’t entirely wasted as
we learnt a lot in a very stable environment which made rolling out Mobiflock
to other operating systems very quick.

How do you keep yourself motivated?

Remind yourself
of your original vision and have faith in that. Make sure you celebrate your
successes along the way, even though you know you still have a long journey
ahead of you.

Did you have a mentor?

I don’t believe
in a single mentor; rather surround yourself with a group of people you can
turn to for advice and different perspectives.

How long does it take for a venture to get off the ground, in your
experience?

Three years
seems to be the time most companies get sufficient traction and momentum to be
a viable concern with critical mass, market acceptance, an established product
and healthy revenues.

Is it ever alright to give up on a dream?

Dreams are like
ideas, they’re a dime a dozen – it’s acting on them that matters. And the
reality is that you may need to modify your dreams when reality bites in the
shape of children to feed.

Which three character traits do all entrepreneurs possess?

A “glass half-full”
mentality. Tenacity. And the ability to identify an opportunity, build a
vision, and then communicate this to your founder team, your staff, your
customers and the market at large.

Do you believe in internships for your business?

Yes, it’s a
good way of paying it forward and also grooming potential future employees. To
apply, especially if you are a developer, email jobs@mobiflock.com

If you could give yourself any advice back then, what are your top
5 wisdoms?

*It doesn’t
get any easier While it was tough raising funding a decade ago, it’s become
10 times tougher since then, which means it takes up even more of your time,
energy and focus as an entrepreneur.

*Don’t plan
for funding Rather plan to not get funded at all, rather to build a solid,
sustainable business that can stand on its own two feet.

*Dance to your
own tune Don’t be put off if you don’t tick the current “funding flavour of
the month” check boxes. As long as you have done your homework, identified a
distinct market need and proven your concept, of course.

*Focus Stay
focussed on your business goals and specifically on getting that first rand of
revenue through the door. Having said that, keep nimble so you don’t miss out
on new developments in the market.

*Get involved One of the biggest changes I’ve noticed comparing getting Mobiflock out of the
starting blocks with launching Clickatell just over a decade ago is the
opportunities we’ve had thanks to the nascent entrepreneurial community
developing in Cape Town and South Africa.